Conscience
by Parallaxm
Summary: He trusts her when he can scarcely trust himself. [Spoilers up to chapter 94.]


_ Conscience_

.

It all comes down to how you know what you know is true.

He'd always thought the term "conscience" to be a joke—the science of conning your mind. In the end, you don't know shit. You assume. You believe.

And when it crumbles, you crumble.

For Heine, fate is a fucking drag. Everything about his origin is twisted and inevitable. It's not that he's been dealt a terrible hand—his very existence is a royal flush—but Angelika's the one raking in the profits. And no matter what he bets, he'll never lose. She'll always win. Every mirror he faces will mock him. Because he is her doing. She is not a layer of ectodermal tissue he can tear from his surface; she is the intent buried within his flesh, and no amount of blood or bile will erase her claim. _Its _claim.

Every man down makes him more Kerberos and less Heine. His kill count now consists of more adults than children. That this fact actually mollifies him makes it even worse.

Heine Rammsteiner is an extremely useful person to everyone but himself.

In any case, what he's been dealt is not as sorry as Naoto's hand—two blank cards plus a two and a ten. Not much you can do with that. Better just fold and get out while they haven't upped the ante. Forget the fact that they're not supposed to deal blank cards; they did, they're yours, what can you do?

Shoot 'em or beat it.

That's what Badou would say.

What no one says is that if your life is a gamble, you don't care about bankruptcy anymore. You just keep digging into your pockets 'till you're out of juice. Lay it all on the table, your entire worth. Badou opts for setting aside a cigarette fund, the equivalent of being too miserly to write a will. It's his analgesic, and to an extent they all depend on one. Numb the pain before it kills you.

It'll never kill Heine.

.

.

.

Then he meets her.

And damn, even her tragedy is more righteous than his will ever be.

Everything about her gets on his nerves—the way he unconsciously stiffens upon sight of her unruly charcoal locks, the fact that he eventually stiffens because it's _her_ and not because she's female, the way her eyes scream "I know what I want," and expect you to deliver it or get lost (and there's nothing to her name, not a single penny, so who does she think she is? She doesn't even fucking know who she is), the sinuous way she moves in battle: arcs and edges in one stroke, the way her wrist felt against his palm, her pulse under his fourth finger, the way she speaks, articulating consonants 'till they're chiseling away at your eardrums.

She even looks him in the eye and says she doesn't give a damn about his little story, his little despair, and just wants what she came for: answers. And what's stopping her? She's gotten this far. Beneath her boots is more than ground, dirt and dust. Beneath her feet lies a path she will chart herself, led only by a semblance of a moral compass and a trusted weapon she can wield.

She does not know her own meaning.

He envies her for that.

.

.

.

Categories shape relationships.

Friend. Enemy. Family.

Fuyumine Naoto.

She was just... there. She'd wedged herself into his life like a blade in his side—_exactly_ like a blade in his side—bleeding him like a spigot. But he dared to take her face in his hands anyway, because if she had the right to his blood, he ought to be able to understand hers, and why it was draining away from her cheeks, an ashen mask of _help me _in less explicit terms.

In the end, Heine is uncertain whether Naoto's blade is a blessing or a curse.

He'd wondered—was he immortal?

She'd answered—fuck no.

She could end him before he had a chance to be anything more than a monster; she could end him when he needed it most, she could end him when he was ready to end, if he could ever be ready to forgive himself (he would never be ready). So why should it matter if he dies or not, if he can never change what he lives for?

She is, of course, the difference.

His shoulders can loosen a fraction of an inch because he knows she can hold her own, that she will give him hell if he loses it, that she is capable of keeping a promise he can't expect anyone else to keep. He would die for Nill, but he wouldn't be able to. Die, that is.

She approaches him from behind, footfalls soft for such a hardheaded woman.

They say nothing.

She mutters hoarsely, "I'm sorry."

It is inadequate and she knows, but anything else would sound like an excuse.

He still doesn't turn. "You're not the problem." He touches the collar around his neck, feeling the cool metal burn into his fingers. "We were made a certain way."

She grants him a pained smile. "No matter what I do to you, you'll have to live with the aftermath. We were made a certain way, but you must live regardless."

He turns then, crimson eyes catching Prussian blue. _The beast will never rest._

"Do your worst." He cracks a smirk attempting to be a smile. "We'll be each other's last resort."

.

.

.

When he finds out, he pities her. Just a bit.

Because fate's having a fucking field day and even hell won't take Angelika now, not after she's redefined the term itself. The perverse excuse for a scientist is a behemoth so grotesque Heine doesn't even think about killing her, about taking her itty-bitty neck between his canine teeth and snapping it in two. To die would be too merciful for Angelika Einstürzen. Can demons even die when their sole ambition is to haunt?

The abnormal, abstruse Heine Rammsteiner is now more "normal" than the blade maiden.

_Naoto_ is the exception. The chosen one. The vessel.

Heine is the dog. The servant. The soldier.

The thought of Angelika writhing in Naoto's body sends spasms of revulsion down his spine.

_Congrats. She's more fucked up than you are. _

He finds her staring out the stained glass windows of the underground church, reds, blues, and yellows alight on her face. A warm wash of sunlight on skin is the closest thing to mercy they'll ever experience. Since they returned, Naoto hasn't spoken a word. She has been staunchly avoiding the bishop, and Heine can just imagine her thin lips moving to the concise, clinical words, _"He tried to kill me."_ He can imagine repressing the urge to snort, "_So?_ _You tried to kill me too."_

He doesn't move from the doorway. She knows he's there. You don't survive on slashing enemies—you survive on knowing when to run and when to fight.

But there's no running from the truth.

In the silence he walks over (but doesn't really) and asks (but not really), "How's it feel? Knowing you're not even meant to be you."

It's not Heine's style to conduct probing psychoanalyses on people who have just realized they've been fed a lie their entire life. In fact, he's instinctually inclined to look out for those made vulnerable by fate. Heine's role has been recycled far too many times for him to count—protector, beast, entertainment, experiment, killer, man (if you could call him one)—so the sudden reserve of gentleness he displays comes naturally, a spring welling up from the depths.

Heine just stands there, and today it is enough. Today he reaches her, and she invites his silence without hostility.

There are people who make you afraid you'll lose yourself. His fist tightens as he pictures Giovanni in his pressed suit, the damn coward who ran out of tears and began stockpiling bullets. What he cannot believe is that the guy hates himself more than he hates his source of self: their "mother." There are people who make you afraid you'll lose them. He hears Nill's tinkling laugh. He hears a little girl talking about flowers. He has to stop there or his nightmares will never relent. There are people who make you afraid you don't _have _a self to begin with. He supposes, fundamentally, that this is what ties him to Naoto—a lack of identity. And a wretch of a woman to blame. Not that placing blame changed anything. What's done is done.

So they latched onto hatred. It kept them hot when all else was cold.

_"__Would it be better if you had something worth fighting for, Heine?" she'd sighed, twisting a strand of hair between her fingers. "If you had a family to feed, would you fight for their sake?"_

_"__I did have a family," he snarled, eyes clouded with bloodlust. _

Then there are people who terrify you because you're beginning to trust them on a level you can't hold yourself to. On a level that exceeds your own control. Heine would hunt Badou Nails down if the information broker ever defaulted on his word in a crucial moment. Partner or no, there are consequences. He could not say the same for her. He could not imagine a scenario in which she might be tempted to betray him.

He did not want to.

Naoto could not afford the luxury of cathartic tears. Her legs were built to move, sore or loose. She could cry, but the release would amount to little more than a leaking faucet; what remained was still her burden to bear, sink or swim. She would still have to get up and finish the job, muscles clenching, teeth grinding. Her legs were built to move. Fuyumine taught her to. She convinced herself to. It is far better to sustain a wound than to lie in a puddle of sickly, viscous red. It is far better to move than to mourn.

Her legs were built for the former, her heart seemingly for the latter.

Because she is always seeking something, even if it is something to seek.

.

.

.

What she could not find, Heine gave.

And when Heine could not ask, she answered.

.

.

They were each other's conscience.

.


End file.
